Great thread!
I'm a horror movie and horror video game addict. I don't know why I love to be scared, but I do!
I've played just about every "scary" or "creepy" game on various consoles and a number on PC, but some of my favorites and a few choice scary moments contained in them would have to include...
1. Condemned - the overall atmosphere, but the shopping mall level wins hands down! Freaky! (I can't wait for Condemned2 - it looks and sounds awesome!)
2. Resident Evil 4 - The whole game, but the highpoint for me was the first time you meet the chainsaw dude. I was in that house and just waltzed outside and the cut scene began and the next thing I knew, my head was sawed off!
I had just saved, so the next go around I didn't know what to do about him, so I used the sniper rifle, opened the door, shot at him from a distance and he came running toward me. I ran back into the house and ran up that flight of stairs and waited at the top, (I was scared and started freaking out). I could see a portion of the front door to the house from the top of the stairs, eventually I saw him burst into the house, and I basically just killed him from the top of the stairs (like a wussy chicken). I waited for him to get closer and then blasted him with the shotgun. He would fall down the stairs and get up again and I'd shoot again, rinse-repeat until he was dead. I thought about trying that section again right after I killed him, but I was too freaked out by that time and moved on in the game.
3. Half-life 2 - Ravenholm (and the game overall) was awesome, but also really freaking creepy! Like when you're standing in the hallwall and that woman is telling you that they don't go there anymore and you walk up to the door with the little window and you can't see very far past the door, but later when you actually have to go there you didn't know what to expect and the creepy factor just gets in your head. Perfectly executed!
4. Eternal Darkness - totally awesome game! I loved the way it would scare you and then just totally mess with your head. I can remember playing that game and at one point an enemy jumped out, the screen "changed", and my head was chopped off. Then it said GAME OVER and I was like what the heck? Then it suddenly went back to where I was before the weird encounter and my head was back. At that point I knew I was in for one hell of a ride! Loved it!
5. They Hunger (Half-Life PC mod) - I highly recommend this mod of the original Half-Life on PC. It might be a little hard to find these days, because I think the only place to get it was on demo disks from PC Gamer magazine quite a few years ago. There were three "episodes", which would consist of about 20-hours of gameplay each, maybe less if you played through quickly and skip some stuff.
Who did that game? I want to say Neil Manke or something like that. You may be able to find it on a downloadable Half-Life website...DOWNLOAD THIS GAME SERIES! All of the episodes were great (Episode one is the best), but let me detail two situations in that series that freaked me out (but there were many more).
(They Hunger) #1 - Opening level in episode one - You crash your car into water after lightning strikes the roadway. You swim around and exit the water through this tunnel and make your way to a church. You have no weapons (only a flashlight) and theres a radio saying there have been strange reports of the dead returning to life. You find an umbrella and right after that this nasty looking zombie (that I thought was just a corpse) gets up and attacks you and you have to kill it with an umbrella. After you collect some items (and find a handgun upstairs in the bell tower) another zombie bursts from a coffin (complete with a scary looking Jesus mural on the wall). When you go back outside which was deserted when you arrived at the church, you find out that zombies are coming out of the ground and you can hear them moaning and shuffling toward you. This was the opening level of the game and left me feeling like I had to pee!
(They Hunger) #2 - Episode three - One of the levels begins in a hospital and you haven't encountered any zombies yet. You're walking around and you can hear voices in the distance, then a woman's voice says "Where are the babies? I must check on the babies..." soon after an ugly zombie nurse just pops out and attacks. That scared me enough that I screamed out loud (probably sounding like a scared little girl).
Runner-ups - Doom 3, Bioshock, Resident Evil remake on GC, Dead Rising...
As far as movies...have any of you ever seen Session 9? Not that gory, but really creepy. I wouldn't dare go into that old abandoned asylum.
I love Romero flicks, 28 Days/Weeks Later, Return Of The Living Dead 1-3, Re-Animator, The Thing...(and hundreds more)
For you readers out there be sure to check out The Rising and City Of The Dead by Brian Keene. Great books and a great horror author!
(I think they are trying to make The Rising into a movie, could be totally awesome if they can pull it off!)
